Yesterday, Kirby told the assembled Faculty that copies had been sent to department chairs as well. But Professor of Astronomy Alyssa A. Goodman, a member of the Allston science task force who read a copy in her department chair’s office, noted that faculty were still required to read the report behind closed doors.

“I’ve read the letter, and I just don’t understand the need for it to be so confidential,” Goodman said.

Fisher said Faculty were upset that a document so central to the Allston planning currently on the table is still shrouded in secrecy.

“Several people made the comment about it being disgraceful—or words to that effect—that it has not been distributed to the Faculty,” Fisher said. “I think that’s the wide perception.”

He added that the letter epitomized the general dearth of information that he said has characterized Allston planning to date.

“Why aren’t we being told?” Fisher asked. “We’re not even being told what areas of Allston we’re talking about and how much money we’re talking about.”

Burgard said that the issue of whether FAS science should move to Allston at all—not just what science should move—was raised at the meeting.

Fisher said that he was the first Faculty member to speak after the initial presentations, comparing the difference between the University’s Allston planning and how planning should run to the difference between “creation science and real science.”

“[Allston] is the answer, and we’ve been asked to fill in the questions to which that is the answer,” he said. “That is the worst possible way to do planning, and it has been ruining the possibilities of doing all sorts of other things—what we should be doing in the sciences, what we should be doing in Cambridge, what hiring we should be doing.”

Professor of Physics and Allston science task force member Charles M. Marcus said that, largely due to this concern, professors focused their remarks on broader issues of science curriculum and Cambridge planning, so the meeting marked a “shift in focus.”

But Fisher said he worried that administrators would disregard Faculty concern.

“It’s shocking,” he said. “And it’s shocking that not only is it being driven this way by the president and provost, but that the FAS is going along with it.”

—Staff writer Stephen M. Marks can be reached at marks@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Lauren A.E. Schuker can be reached at schuker@fas.harvard.edu.